AMT Ohio George`s '33 Willys Malco Gasser

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Everyone see the Round2 newsleter today - vol 4 issue 2 ? Sounds like they are reissuing Some of Ohio`s cars.
Fisrt a Snap Dragons willys with Malco Gasser markings. Then the 1/25 glue Willys, They are looking in to see about the Malco Mustang , & they said they might of found the tool for the Mr Gasket Mustang. Great news !
Chris

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It would be nice to see it reissued with original box art and correct Ohio George decals, and Round2 ABSOLUTLEY NEEDS TO update the wheels and include better tires, as the off-road looking Goodyear Rally GT tire the kit has included since the '70s are horrible.

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The AMT (not MPC) kit did come with a chopped roof. If you check Gasser Wars publication by Larry Davis you will see that Ohio George ran a chopped version at on time and also a Stock height roof at one time also. As you can see from my avatar I used a resin body to build mine.

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KOOL NEWS! ROUND 2, CAN WE SEE THE MPC MOLDED MULTI-MAVERICK AGAIN WITH OHIO GEORGE DECALS IN IT AGAIN? THE MALCO GASSER AND THE MR GASKET CAR USED THE SAME CHASSIS IN THOSE KITS.FOR THE MR GASKET MUSTANG, HOW ABOUT DOING A MOLDED CLEAR BODY EXCLUSIVE FOR THE ROUND 2 STORE? ALSO RELEASE AT RANDOM A PLASTIC MOLDED METALLIC RED MR GASKET BODY, ONE TO A CASE, LIKE THE MEYERS MANX DUNE BUGGY YOU DID.FINALLY GIVE US AN UPDATED VERSION OF THE MR GASKET MUSTANG WITH A TWIN-TURBO BOSS 429 IN IT. DO THE 33 WILLYS WITH A STOCK ROOF HEIGHT, ALSO.THANKS FOR LSTENING ROUND 2!!!1

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The history of Ohio George's cars is very interesting. I researched through my magazine collection once. His first Drag car was a 34 Ford 3-window in a familiar shade of light blue. He built the Willys in 59 and he won the NHRA nats drag race AND car show first time out! His cars were always show quality. It had a Caddy engine with a chain drive for the blower, full body including running boards and moon discs. As he developed the car he raised the chassis height, used alloy wheels, and started to trim the body. In about '62 or so he switched to a small block Chevy stroked out. Later he switched to the Cammer when he got Ford sponsorship. He finally had to change from a Ford banjo rear end to a more modern diff to hold up to power of the Cammer. it was a miracle that the old rear end lasted with a blown Caddy and Chevy engine in it!! After about a year with the Cammer he chopped the top. The AMT kit was the ultimate development of the car and is an outstanding and accurate kit.

The Malco gasser was built with a Willys frame under it. Gas class rules called for a frame and the Mustang was unibody and George already knew what to do with a Willys Frame to make it go! The MPC kit is actually pretty poor for one big reason. They modified the 66 Mustang tooling to try to make it look like a 67. It ddidn't work very well. The chassis and everything else is pretty good. If one would adapt a real 67 body to the MPC kit they would have a nice accurate model.

I never examined the Mr. Gasket Gasser kit so I can't comment on it. I do believ the kit is the mechanically supercharged version. George changed it over twin turbos a few years later.

The Multi-maverick kit has the reverse problem of the Malco gasser! The body is great but it has totally the wrong chassis under it. MPC slipped one of their generic full round tube funny car frames under it. Gas class rules at that time called for rectangular tube frames. George built his own which does not even resemble the kit frame.

After those cars George ran an alcohol funny car with twin turbos which NHRA would not let him run. He also built a turbocharged AA/MC (modified compact) Pinto which was featured in old Car Craft mag.

I believe he quit racing at that point ( mid 70s) and ran his machine shop. He ended up supplying engines for the Buick V-6 Indy car series for many years.

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Actually the Multi Maverick has a exact frame but the body is wrong. (with exception to the cage i think) The body has that stupid hood scoop on it and the spoiler is wrong along with the roof line. At one point I was building a master for this car also but it got shelved as there was no interest at the time. By the time the Multi Maverick came about the rules has changed to alow the use of box tubing for frames as the stock willys frames were getting used up and also because of unibody constuction of cars.

Your corect on the 67. That thing was an atrocity to a 67 Mustang. I did the correct body years ago and it actually fit the original Malco gasser Mustang with only a bit of modifying. This body is no longer available however as Fremont racing is no longer, but I still have the master and it's being reworked. FWIW, many consider this car to be the downfall of AA/GS and a real game changer in the class.

Someday I will build all the cars he's ran over the years as I think it would make a neat display.

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The only "old" part of the banjo rear axle was the center section; all of the stuff inside was new. The reason for keeping the center section was that it had a torque tube and not a driveshaft with universal joints. The torque tube acted as a third traction bar. When the Pontiac rear axle was installed, the torque tube setup was retained. The Chevy engine/early Ford "banjo" rear axle setup seems to have been transplanted into George's "Hurst Gasser Passer" English Ford Prefect.

Both Mustangs have fiberglass bodies. The '67 body is said to be a Ford Engineering piece, the same one that was used to design the body dies. It would have been used to determine where the steel body panels would be joined, where the spot welds would be, where the hinges would be placed, where access holes would be needed for routing wires on the assembly line, things like that. While the first Mustang was under construction, the rules still required a production car frame. Shortly after it was finished, fully fabricated frames were allowed in the interest of safety. The '69 Mustang used a Willys frame again because George simply stuck with what he knew would work. The '69 body is a "splash" taken from a pre-production car.

There's a 1971 issue of HOT ROD with a feature article on the Multi-Maverick. The kit chassis is pretty much spot-on (mostly rectangular tubing, not round). There's also an interview with George somewhere out there, where he stated that MPC bankrolled the construction of the 1:1 car in exchange for the rights to make the model. (Not farfetched: MPC did kits of three of George's cars, and each was in the catalog for a long time.) The body is off, particularly in the areas of the hood and rear wheel openings. Like the AMT XR-6 Dodge Deora kits, the development of the kit went hand-in-hand with the construction of the 1:1 car, and occasionally got ahead of it to the point where some details don't match. There is another MPC Maverick kit (Jolly Roger funny car) that uses the Multi-Maverick body with a flat hood (the JR has a different chassis that places the engine entirely inside the body). One of those, even a built one, could supply the unscooped hood to help correct the Multi-Maverick. Neither issue of the MM had decals that got close to the look of the 1:1 car either.

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i would like to point out that the original malco gasser mustang kit had a decent looking 1967 rear body section while the flip front was a totally inaccurate 1966 mustang front end. i cut the front end from a 1967 chopped top mustang f/c and modified the hood.the hood buldge was the toughfest part of the conversion.i also opened up the rear wheel openings and added flairing around the lip.the 1969 mr. gasket mustang moulded in clear plastic was not accurate to me.i modified the rear wheel openings like above and cut the front end off the body to make a flip front end.i did a lot of work to the front grille area and scratch built a front spoiler.the only problem i had with the 1933 malco willys was that the front window/frame/opening was too large.one other item i would like to mention is the decals for the mr. gasket mustang should be silver not gold as they were in the original kit.

Edited 2 Jul 2012 by walterbog

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That is the original wheelie bar, the car had only one with a fairly large tire on it, and the Blower scoop is the tall black one, here's some shots I took. The car is now in the Ford Motor Company Museum in Michigan

Edited 1 Jul 2012 by kitswapper

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i dont see the complete wheelie bar assembly in your parts picture, it was located on the chrome tree in the original kit but not in the reissues though you can find it in the 33 willys panel truck kit.just to let you know when george raced the chopped top version of this car the top was one piece with no removable roof panel/tarp.

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i would like to point out that the original malco gasser mustang kit had a decent looking 1967 rear body section while the flip front was a totally inaccurate 1966 mustang front end.

The body has a '66 front end because it was reworked from the MPC 1966 fastback body. The body sides look something like a 1967 but the rear window opening was altered from the 1966 (squared off lower corners). They could only change it so much, if you compare to any of the 1967-68 stock bodies out there the rear window on the flip-front car is much smaller. Best choice for a more correct replacement would be the AMT 1967 annual kit body, second choice would be the mid-Nineties AMT/Ertl 1967 fastback. The annual kit body is a bit thinner, the newer one could be thinned out by doing some grinding on the inside.

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I hate being a nitpicker but if AMT is going to re-release the '33 Willys I hope they will repair the indent in the top of the driver's door frame.It's been present in the last several re-issues and it bugs me !

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round 2 has photos of the actual model of the ohio george malco gasser 33 willys and amt has listened to us and made corrections to the original kit. the front window/frame is smaller,the blower scoop is larger,the front end/grill area has the two bumps as per the actual car,the rear halibrands are accurate, the decals are are more detailed, and the roof is one piece with no opening as per the original car.these are some changes that jump out to me and im sure there are more i missed but the main point is they listened and made the changes which might be a first for a reissue.thank you amt and model cars magazine forum. www.round2models.com/models/amt